Posts Tagged ‘christmas’

It may seem strange to be talking about Christmas so early, but it is always good to be prepared I think! Last week, on one of the hottest days of the year, I took a trip to London to attend Iceland’s Christmas in July event at the swanky One Belgravia. It was a chance to take a peek at their upcoming Christmas range and to feast on an abundance of delectable festive goodies. (more…)

Christmas may be over and we may be in the throes of the usual January healthy eating resolutions, but I think that there is still place for cake (there is always place for cake); particularly one that uses up leftovers. I had a jar of my homemade mincemeat left over from Christmas; it would probably have kept till next year but I don’t have much storage space so wanted to use it up quickly. I had already made mincemeat and marzipan cinnamon buns and had bought a new bundt tin in the sales that had yet to be used so mincemeat bundt cake it was. (more…)

You’ve probably all decorated your Christmas cakes (if you have one) already, what with it being Christmas eve eve today (already! How?!); but on the off chance that you haven’t yet gotten round to it, I thought I would share how I’ve chosen to decorate mine this year. (more…)

After making my own mincemeat recently I found myself with rather a lot of it! There are only so many mince pies a girl can eat (though that number may be quite high), so I tried to think of some other ways to use some of it up. The best way I came up with was these mincemeat and marzipan cinnamon buns, which also helpfully used up the marzipan leftover from covering my Christmas cake. (more…)

These chocolate dipped Lebkuchen are really easy to make, keep well and embody all the flavours of Christmas. Lebkuchen are a traditional German festive biscuit, similar to gingerbread but are softer and more cakey. They are made with honey, ground almonds and lots of spices and are topped with a sweet glaze as well as often being dipped in chocolate. (more…)

This is your NINE DAYS till Christmas warning! I hope you are all more prepared than I am, I’ve only bought one gift so far! I’m never usually quite this disorganised… The last minute rush to get everything sorted is on! If you are also unprepared and didn’t get round to baking a fruitcake yet (or just don’t like fruitcake), then this red velvet bundt cake with white chocolate peppermint cream cheese glaze makes a great festive alternative as it doesn’t need to be baked in advance. (more…)

It never feels like Christmas is close for me until I’ve had my first mince pie; they are an absolute essential in making me feel festive and I love them. While I enjoy most mince pies, shop bought or otherwise, as with most things you just can’t beat homemade ones, and if you do make your own then you get the bonus of festive baking, which always helps to put me in a Christmassy mood. If you are going to go through the effort of making your own (and they really aren’t that much effort at all), then you might as well make your own mincemeat too – again, homemade is so much better than shop bought. (more…)

Are you prepared for Christmas yet? Most years I’m super organised and have all my gift shopping finished by now, but this year I haven’t bought a single thing yet and don’t even know what to get anyone. I have put my Christmas tree up though, I usually wait until about the 15th to decorate it but I wanted to use it as a backdrop for food photos so up it went! (With much complaining from my fiancé – he’s not big on Christmas). (more…)

So it is somehow December already and I have done no Christmas shopping or planning whatsoever; I wont be hosting Christmas lunch (my house is essentially a building site at the moment) but I do need to make dessert and some Christmassy nibbles. I did manage to be organised enough to bake a rich Christmas fruitcake last week though; I haven’t yet decided how I want to decorate it but I’ve got a few weeks left to come up with something. (more…)

Last week I was lucky enough to be invited along to a blogger Christmas party hosted by HomeSense, who sell the most gorgeous and eclectic homeware. It was hosted in The Lost and Found cocktail bar in Birmingham (my home town), in “The Bar Behind The Bookcase” – a lovely little private bar and function room hidden away behind, you guessed it, a bookcase. The event was a chance for Homesense to show off a few key pieces from their fantastic Christmas range, and for the bloggers to mingle and get to know each other a bit better. (more…)